Usha Usha, a Farewell Lesson from a Wise Cajamarquino Bar Owner

So, this is it. My half-year in Peru is coming to an end – no doubt the fastest and most action-packed 6 months of my life. When I think back on the best memories I've had of this country, they always start with people. I've been fortunate enough to be part of two incredible programs – one that allowed me to volunteer clearing Inca ruins in the Andean cloudforest for a month in July, and the other that brought me to Lima to study archaeology at the Pontifica Universidad Catolica del Peru. I've met people from all corners of the globe- from as far away as Australia and Japan to fellow Americans, and of course, local Peruvians.

This past week I took my final journey across Peru, traveling up North, the only part of the country I had yet to visit. I'd probably characterize this trip by a strange encounter I had in Cajamarca, while visiting a bar with some friends from my study abroad program. We came across a hole-in-the-wall place called Usha Usha on a dark street a few blocks from the Plaza de Armas. We thought it was closed at first, but we decided to try to go in anyway, and found a dimly lit room that looked like the inside of a hobbit's house in Lord of the Rings.

The walls were covered in scribbled messages from visitors, and the chairs consisted of wooden benches matched with rocky wooden tables. We almost turned around and left when a stout old man popped out and told us to come inside. He sat us down in a corner and started what would probably be the most long-winded and rambling lecture I think I'll ever hear come out of the mouth of a bar owner. He told us that we were the bearers of our culture, that we were the young people who would save the world, that sex is a good thing, but not in excess, and that mining was destroying the livelihoods of Cajamarquinos, residents of the second poorest state in Peru.

Several times I looked at my friends to see if they wanted to leave, just because I wasn't sure if the man would ever finish talking, until finally he sat down and picked up a guitar. The bar still empty, dark, and silent, he played for us – songs from all over Latin America, songs about love and poverty, songs that made me laugh uncontrollably and songs that put me deep in thought about my time in Peru.

Before we left, we asked the man what “Usha Usha” meant, and he told us it's an expression used by Andean farmers to herd their animals, but that it also has the significance of forcing the bad omens away. Essentially, he told us, he opened his bar as a way to bring good people together, and to keep negativity away. Now that I'm leaving Peru and am thinking about what this trip meant to me, usha usha seems like a good motto to keep with me – that no matter where you go and how difficult things can be, you just have to create spaces that draw the good people in close.